Thursday, August 8, 2013

Wells Fargo ranks higher than rival Bank of America on a scorecard released Thursday that analyzes profitability, capital strength and asset quality, among other things.

According to Bank Director magazine's ranking, San Francisco-based Wells is in fifth place, while Charlotte-based Bank of America is 19th, among banks with more than $50 billion in assets.

A look at how some of the other publicly traded banks with a Charlotte presence did: Fifth Third Bancorp, seventh place; PNC Financial Services Group, ninth; BB&T Corp., 11th; SunTrust Banks, 17th.

As a group, the 289 banks included in the latest scorecard performed better than those in the 2012 ranking, the magazine said. The scorecard is divided into three asset categories: $50 billion and up, $5 billion to $50 billion and $1 billion to $5 billion.

Little Rock, Ark.-based Bank of the Ozarks, which this year opened its first full-service branch in Charlotte, placed first in the $1 billion to $5 billion group. Charlotte-based community bank Park Sterling Corp. came in at No. 104 in that same asset category.